Chapter 10: Oscorp and Stark Industries
Defeating Squid-Man wasn't Batman's goal. Antagonizing his employer Kingpin and extracting information about Oscorp's human experiments on Squid-Man—that was Batman's purpose.
"I... heh, you're Batman, right? You worked so hard making these traps just to ask this? Come closer, I'll tell you everything..."
Squid-Man's internal organs began contracting, preparing to spray ink the moment Batman showed his face.
He was also buying time. The intense electric current had nearly paralyzed his body. He needed to recover, regain strength to break free from the webbing binding him.
Footsteps sounded behind Squid-Man, followed by an extremely subtle "hiss."
Before Squid-Man could understand, one of his tentacles was firmly gripped.
His tentacles had been grabbed by more than one woman. Squid-Man knew very clearly what palm contact should feel like.
He somewhat doubted this so-called "Batman" was even human, because the hand gripping his tentacle felt... like some kind of reptilian claw.
The next second, tremendous force from that hand hurled Squid-Man through the air.
Squid-Man's heart leaped with joy. He quickly twisted his body mid-air, trying to completely escape the web net, waiting only for the instant he landed to flee.
'This guy definitely isn't human. Maybe like me, he underwent some experiment at Oscorp and turned into a lizard or something...'
Squid-Man's mind raced while his eight tentacles rapidly cleared webbing from his body.
But he quickly fell into despair. While airborne from being thrown, webbing with tremendous friction kept shooting from all directions, sticking to his body and binding together.
That wasn't all. Where Squid-Man was about to land, a broken concrete slab lay with steel rebar protruding menacingly, seemingly ready to impale his body the next moment.
Squid-Man didn't fear webbing. Even bound, he could slowly break free with time. But once that rebar penetrated his body, even if he didn't die, Squid-Man wouldn't have a good time.
"Devil, you're a devil!"
Squid-Man's voice screamed with a crying tone. Batman remained unmoved. Only when Squid-Man was mere inches from the rebar, when he'd squeezed his eyes shut waiting for death, did Batman finally shoot a strand of webbing to catch him.
"Speak."
Batman's voice was low. He simultaneously tore away the webbing he'd wrapped around his hands as friction gloves to firmly grip Squid-Man.
Squid-Man seemed to have his courage completely broken. His eyes stared blankly at the ground, mouth foaming white without producing anything else.
Batman: "..."
He'd used intimidation tactics on Squid-Man to extract the intelligence he wanted. He never imagined actually scaring him like this.
Batman hadn't even gotten to use his other interrogation methods.
"Batman... Batman..."
Squid-Man unconsciously muttered. No matter how Batman struck him, he couldn't answer any questions.
This made Batman somewhat unaccustomed. In Gotham, those super-villains wouldn't cooperate without a full suite of violent interrogation methods. Even when they cooperated then, afterward they'd swagger around.
Of course, this also related to Gotham's exceptionally corrupt police system—rotten from top to bottom—and the legal system lacking capital punishment.
But New York was different. Capital punishment existed here. Most New York police were on the side of lawful justice, just somewhat overwhelmed by the extremely numerous gangs.
One police chief known for integrity and fairness had impressed Batman—George Stacy.
...
George Stacy had just been promoted from police captain to Manhattan precinct chief. This period was his busiest time.
Even at eleven PM, George was still buried in various case files.
Rubbing his tired eyes, just as he was about to end the day's work, suddenly with a bang, some heavy object fell from outside his window, crashing heavily onto the ground below.
He quickly opened the window to look out, only vaguely catching a black shadow flashing between distant buildings.
On the ground, a giant squid was tightly bound in black webbing.
George hurried downstairs, gun drawn, cautiously approaching the squid that kept muttering "Batman, Batman," discovering a paper beneath it.
The paper listed a string of charges, each sufficient to sentence Squid-Man to death.
The chief held the paper, his gaze alternating between it and Squid-Man, finally pulling out his phone to make a call:
"Notify Major Crimes. Overtime tonight."
Though the paper's charges and evidence were irrefutable, as chief George still needed to verify them. Proper procedures still had to be followed.
Batman stood in a high-rise shadow, watching Chief Stacy and his team lock Squid-Man in an iron cage, then immediately turned to leave.
He had too much to do.
First clearing the gel explosives and webbing pre-positioned but unused in the sewers and abandoned shipyard, Batman re-excavated the firearms he'd buried.
When disposing of them last night, he'd had no concept of "Stark Industries" on the crates. But today after hacking the CIA, though Batman hadn't seen all the "Tesseract" information, he'd remembered several keywords.
One keyword was "Howard Stark."
Clatter clatter...
In the deepest part of the abandoned shipyard, in the temporary operations center, Batman's ten fingers flew across the keyboard. Webpage after webpage opened. Information about "Howard Stark" appeared one after another.
"Howard Stark, American inventor, scientist, engineer, and industrialist. Founder and CEO of Stark Industries..."
"Only son Tony Stark, current CEO and Chairman of Stark Industries, world's richest man..."
As usual before shutting down the computer, Batman erased all traces of his presence on the internet, then immediately left the abandoned shipyard heading toward Manhattan's Upper East Side.
He was going to visit Tony Stark, see if he could learn something about the "Tesseract" from him.
However, Batman's current direction wasn't toward Stark Industries, but its complete opposite—the company owned by Harry's father that had invested in Otto's fusion experiment, "Oscorp."
Without learning more about Oscorp's human experiments from the CIA and Squid-Man, Batman decided to go personally.
"Human experiments, serum, super soldiers..."
Batman silently repeated these words as he infiltrated Oscorp's headquarters tower.